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Civic Battle on Bikes

Posted on | January 29, 2014

I recently walked by this awesome light installation that was exposed in the passage of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. I met one of the artists, Onne Walsmit who gave me details about this urban intervention which was one of the higlights of this year’s Amsterdam Light Festival.

The lightwork is designed by ‘Venividimultiplex’, an artist collective, consisting of Joost van Bergen, Dirk Schlebusch and Onne Walsmit. It was sponsored by InventDesign and DHL Express.

The interactive arch determines the ‘strongest’ cyclists. Attached to the arch are… Read more

“When you switch off the light, the art is gone”

Posted on | February 3, 2013

Dan Flavin’s fluorescent tubes recently lit up the Museum of Modern Art in Vienna. If you’re slightly interested in light art, you’ve probably come across some of Flavin’s fluorescent tube sculptures. Looking at the colourful tubes, how they lighten up their surrounding and observing how the light affects your emotions is one way of encountering his art. But when you dive deeper, hearing about the time, the 60’s to be precise, when Flavin experimented with the materiality of something that is immaterial (due to the fact that light consists of gas and is therefore defined as immaterial), you start to understand the implications on the discussion ‘what is art? and ‘what does it teach us?’.

In the early 60s, Flavin chose the commercially available fluorescent tubes to signalise the increasing proximity of art with everyday life and the consumer world. The ways in which he presents his sculptures derive from principles of ‘minimalist’ sobriety (Minimalism is any design or style in which the simplest and fewest elements are used to create the maximum effect). His early series of ICONS illustrate the development from pictures to light-related work and the transcendence of traditional forms of art.

The canvass turns into a simple support plate for the light bulb and fluorescent tube whose radiant exitance dominate the sculptures.

His spatially-oriented light art dissolves the corners of indoor spaces and immerses the viewer in an imaginary, intermingled, blurred colour space. Imagine his work ‘an artificial barrier of blue, red and blue fluorescent light’ from 1968 as a…

Highlights of the Fête des lumières 2012 in Lyon

Posted on | December 11, 2012

‘La Fête des Lumières’ – the Festival of Lights – is an annually held event that takes place in Lyon, France.

The festival expresses gratitude towards Mary, mother of Jesus, on December 8 of each year. Every house places candles along the outsides of all the windows which has a beautiful aesthetical effect throughout the streets. The festival, which includes dozens of activities based on light lasted as usual 4 days, with the peak of activity on December 8th.

There were light displays projected onto iconic buildings and many light installations were mounted throughout the city. This was my third year at the festival and seeing the latest trends in light design from artists around the world influences my work and my knowledge tremendously.

The entire collection of installations with artists and the explanations behind the art work can be purchased on request at dk@cowsinjackets.com